(Published in The Press Democrat, "Let the Public Speak," Mar 15, 1996, Santa Rosa, California)
Readers who believe in a loving creator who has made mankind in His own image will sorrow over the March 7 news report of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that a terminally ill adult has a constitutional right to "utilize a doctor's assistance in hastening his death."
We all have a God-given right to choose life or death. In fact, one could say we have no choice but to choose.
As our world chooses death and darkens morally, the true light of God's unfathomable and unquenchable love for all people will never be extinguished, not even if we start killing Alzheimer's patients.
Judge Beezer, in his dissenting opinion, warned that the ruling could create a "death-oriented culture" where next will come voluntary euthanasia, followed by choosing death for a patient "in their best interest."
My grandmother has Alzheimer's. She can't say our names or remember exactly who we are. But the person we know is still glimpsed in her concern for others, her smile, her sparkling, intense eyes. She doesn't have autonomy but she does have personal dignity--because she is loved.
Alzheimer's cannot put out the light of God within her. Neither can a pro-death court decision put out the light of God's law of life.
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Copyright © 1996, 2006, Catherine Lawton